Project Fall Out
by CarrotsAreCrunchy97
Summary: What if Howard Stark hadn't died and was there to see Steve when he woke from being on ice for 70 years? Had he spent the entire time searching?


What if Howard Stark hadn't died and was there to see Steve when he woke from being on ice for 70 years? Had Howard been searching the whole time? Had he confided in his son about the project he had named Fall Out, the project he set up to keep searching for his long lost friend? How would Steve react to the new world? Would it be easier on him with his friend, and his friend's son, by his side?

Project Fall Out

1st September 1962

Howard Stark watched as his assistant quickly left the room and picked up the file that very few people knew about, the file that contained his search for a long lost friend. A collection of readings, calculations and hypotheses that basically told him that his friend wasn't there and that if he was that he was dead. Howard Stark was not a person who got angry. He was laid back and quite flirtatious when he wanted to be, but this time he was angry. He was angry at Hydra, he was angry at Steve, he was angry at the research team he had out in the north, and he was mostly angry at himself.

He had been looking for his friend for almost twenty years and yet there was still no sign of him and still too much ground to cover. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't make it any quicker or easier to look for his friend, the technology he was working with wasn't advanced enough and he couldn't just jump years ahead of the rest of the world technologically without a war breaking out. They had only just finished looking on the surface but there was also a large amount of water underneath the glaciers and ice caps.

He threw the file at the wall, shouting as he did so. They couldn't force him to shut down the project, not after the last time they attempted to. He couldn't stop looking for his friend. He knew what Dr Erskine had done to Steve Rodgers; he had given him the ability to survive through anything, to survive twenty years under the ice. He'd go out to the Arctic himself and leave no molecule untouched until he found Steve. He'd promised.

29th May 1979

It was his nine year old son's birthday. Anthony Edward Stark was sat on the floor reading a book on electronics while 'playing' with several tools and circuits. Howard pulled out his camera and took a picture of the boy to put in the box he had upstairs. The box that he would give to Steve when they found him. Thirty-five years of history, thirty-five years of memories sat in the box. Newspaper clippings, recordings, various photos, files on his search and all manner of things were waiting for Steve when they found him.

"What are you doing there Tony?" He asked his son, kneeling down to smile at him.

"I'm making you a gift to help find Steve." He said, his tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth slightly in concentration. "It will beep if you find something, I just need to finish wiring this and then I can start on the rest of it."

"You don't need to do that Tony; you could go and play with your friends. Or you could go somewhere with me or your mother, it is your birthday." He told his son, touched that he wanted to help. "This will still be here tomorrow."

"Okay." He agreed, putting everything into a cardboard box. "Can we go to the diner across from the beach?"

"Of course we can." Howard smiled, taking his son's hand. A small part of him wanted Tony to finish what he was working on but the rest of him knew that Steve wouldn't want him to ruin his son's childhood looking for him.

12th July 1987

Howard had taken a day off from his exhausting week reviewing SHIELD to attend his son's graduation. He was graduating MIT at 17 years old. MIT! Tony didn't know he was going to be there but he sat in the back row, cheering as his son collected his diploma. He took a photo and put it in his jacket pocket, saving it for Steve's box. That was when, unfortunately, a man walked up behind him and tapped him on the shoulder.

"We have a lead on Project Fall Out Mr Stark; Agent Carter-Jones would like to speak to you immediately. There's a car waiting outside." A young agent spoke, he motioned for Howard to go with him.

Reluctantly, he rose from his chair and left the graduation the exact moment that Tony spotted him in the crowd.

1st January 1995

Howard drank his fifth scotch as he held back tears. Eight years after the lead they had drilled, dived, excavated and surveyed but there was still no sign of his lost friend. He looked down at the file given to him by Director Fury.

_I hereby shut down Project Fall Out and recall all agents from the search for Captain Steve Rodgers._

He couldn't believe what he had read over and over again. They weren't going to look for his friend any longer; they had given up all hope. 78 years old, 51 years after Steve sacrificed himself; 6 years after his son had taken over Stark Industries, 5 years after he retired. It was unfathomable to him that they could give up on him after everything they had gone through, after all of the resources and time SHIELD had poured into Project Fall Out and they were going to just give up. His life's work had been devoted to finding his friend and they wanted him to leave it to rest, spit on every promise he had made to Peggy Carter the day he had lost his best friend.

"You know instead of wallowing in self pity you could hand the project over to me." Tony's voice appeared from next to him. "Stark Industries was just the sideline to Project Fall Out, the thing to keep you distracted. Let Stark Industries fund it, execute it, finish what you started. Your life's work pushing for your life's goal."

"That's a good analogy kid." He muttered into his glass, taking another drink. "Do it. We can't stop yet, we're so close. I can feel it."

"Happy New Year Dad, now we have something to celebrate about."

19th March 2011

"Dad." A voice called through the house. It was Tony. "Dad we found the Valkyrie. They're calling in a SHIELD team as we speak." He shouted as he ran up the stairs to his father's room.

"What?" A 96 year old Howard croaked, shocked by the news. "We found him?"

"We found him." Tony smiled to his father.

The man limped through the door and out into the landing. "Out of my way son, I have to get to the retirement home. Peggy will want to hear this.

[…]

"After all this time?" Peggy croaked, smiling. "I need to see him." She pushed herself up in her bed and called for a nurse.

The nurse walked in and immediately rushed to Peggy's side. "I need to get out of here and to the Triskelion." She told the nurse. "Help me into my wheel chair."

"I'm not sure it's a good idea for you to leave, you aren't in the most stable condition right now." The nurse argued, bringing the wheel chair over anyway.

"I have been waiting 67 years for them to find Steve Rodgers, I have to go." Peggy argued, sounding more like her old self with every word.

"I'll look after her." Tony piped up from the corner, moving to help Peggy into the wheel chair. "And we'll bring her back before nine." He assured the nurse, pushing Peggy out of the door.

"You'd better, or the doctors won't be happy." The nurse reprimanded before making her way to another room.

"Are you ready for your date?" Howard asked smiling.

"I've been ready since his rain check." She smiled, welcoming the breeze as she was pushed out of the door.

**Steve POV**

I open my eyes and the first thing I see is two haggard faces looking over me, looking almost excited. I suddenly remember talking to Peggy, asking for a rain check, her desperate voice calling his name as everything went black. I sit up and notice that there are in fact three people in the room. An older woman in a wheel chair, an older man sat holding a walking stick and a man who looks eerily like Howard Stark.

"Steve, are you alright?" The woman asks me in a vaguely familiar voice. "You've been through a lot."

"I'm fine, almost." I look around the room and try to figure out where I am. Everything seems so alien, nothing belongs. "Where am I?"

"You're in a medical room at a SHEILD base called the Triskelion." The woman tells me. "Of course that name won't mean anything to you. SHIELD was formed towards the end of World War Two, just after you defeated Hydra and Johan Schmidt."

"The war was still going on when that happened." I argue, not quite understanding what she's not saying. "Who are you?"

"My name is Margaret Carter-Jones. You, along with most of the people I met during the war, used to call me 'Peggy'." She tells me.

I blink a few times, unable to comprehend what she's saying to me. "What?" I manage to push out in my shock. I stare at her, the longer I do, the more and more she looks like Peggy.

"I know this will be hard for you to take in but when you crashed the Valkyrie you were trapped in ice, for years." She tells me. "Howard has searched for you every single day since then. And that was 67 years ago."

Sixty-seven? I've been trapped in ice for almost seventy years? "Where is he?" I ask, my eyes drawn to the man with the walking stick. "Howard?" I ask, finally recognizing him.

"It's been a long time, old friend." He says to me, smiling as he does so.

"I guess it has."


End file.
